Seven Days

A glance at the week that was

Making up for lost time

Samoa plans to switch its clocks forward 24 hours, moving itselffrom one side of the international dateline to the other, in orderto aid business with Australia and New Zealand.

By doing so, the country will lose a day - most likely December30th, according to Samoa's prime minister, Tuilaepa SaileleMalielegaoi, meaning any residents with an occasion to celebrate onthat date will have to make other plans, as it won't exist on theircalendars.

The numbers

37,000

The number of Irish farms classified as economically vulnerable,according to the Teagasc National Farm Survey.

830,000

The number of calls the ISPCC Childline service recorded in 2010,an increase of 20,000 from the previous year. 1,895 The numberof death certificates between 2007 and 2009 that mentioned alcohol,according to the Central Statistics Office.

7,000 The approximate number of jobs lost in the bar tradelast year, according to the Drinks Industry Group of Ireland.

$8.5bn

The price for which Microsoft agreed buy the internet telephonecompany Skype, making it its biggest deal to date. 41

The record number of new "legal highs" reported across Europe in2010.

We now know

Arnold Schwarzenegger and his wife , Maria Shriver , haveseparated after 25 years of marriage.

Ryan Tubridy will make his BBC debut on July 23rd, taking overGraham Norton's BBC Radio 2 show for eight weeks.

Road deaths in Ireland have halved over the past 10 years,according to the Garda and the Road Safety Authority.

Give me a crash course in . . . Greece (again) Greece is inthe news again. What's going on? Greece received a [euro]110 billionbailout last year, Europe's first sovereign rescue. The plan,however, is failing. The combined pressures of a contracting economyand mounting debt have led to a drastic erosion of marketconfidence. This suggests the country will find it impossible toraise private borrowings next year as foreseen in the bailout. Why is this important? Greece could run out of money next year. Thebailout makes a full provision for its fiscal needs this year, butthe country will need additional financing next year to repayexisting debt and keep the lights on in Athens. The requirement maybe for a sum between [euro]25 billion and [euro]30 billion, butexceptionally high bond yields show that Greece remains shut outfrom private-debt markets. How could that be so? We were told thebailout would put the country on the road to recovery. That's true,but Greek tax revenues remain flat and a slowdown in the publicsector means the country remains locked in a debt trap. Thecountry's international sponsors are very displeased, but they arepowerless to prevent intensified speculation that the country maydefault on its debt to regain control over its wayward publicfinances. That sounds serious? It is. A secretive meeting of topfinance ministers last Friday week in Luxembourg only added to thesense of drama. The ministers had to deny Greece was threatening toleave the euro zone, but there is no doubt the country's financialcrisis is back with a vengeance. What is to be done? The choiceboils down to this: either the country receives more external aid orit tries to reduce its debt burden through restructuring. Eachoption presents serious difficulties. Any new bailout raises seriousquestions about the merits of adding to the country's mountainousdebt. In this argument the accumulation of yet more debt is self-defeating. A further concern is political sensitivity about a newbailout in wealthy countries such as Germany and Finland, where thisis deeply unpopular. Why don't the Greeks default? Tricky. Twooptions are mentioned. The first is a "soft" voluntary restructuringunder which the country's lenders voluntarily agree to extend thematurity of the debt and suspend interest payments. This maymarginally reduce the debt burden, but the voluntary nature of thescheme may not achieve the desired impact. The second option is fora full default, with creditors forced into compulsory haircuts ontheir receivables. The debt haircut: we've heard that one before,haven't we? This proposal bears striking similarity to thesuggestions that senior bondholders in the Irish banks should takelosses as part of the rescue. Dublin wanted to do that, but Europesaid no. Similarly, high-ranking Europeans say they have alreadyruled out restructuring for Greece. What does this mean forIreland? Any effort by Athens to ease the burden of its public debtwould create a precedent that may well be followed by Dublin, butthere is little appetite in Europe for that. Academic debate hasturned in favour of default, but political leaders are reluctant totest the theory that the damage can be minimised. The Germanchancellor, Angela Merkel, and her counterparts may stand accused ofprotecting their banks, but the sovereign debt crisis shows that thestrong countries hold all the power. Arthur Beesley Most readthis week on irishtimes.com 1 Ireland's future depends onbreaking free from bailout 2 Howth faithful bemused at bin Ladenmemorial services 3 Tourist coach crashes in Dublin 4 Queen andObama posters taken down 5 Wedding snub 'difficult' to cope with 6 Kelly's route out of economic crisis is itself a road to ruin 7College president defends [euro]100,000 spent on taxis 8 Welcomefor queen age-old issue 9 Giggs never saw it coming 10 Gardaioutline State visit restrictions Next week you'll need to knowabout . . . Queen Elizabeth Ahead of Queen Elizabeth's visit toIreland next week, here are some facts you may not know about hermajesty. It took 350 women seven weeks to make her weddingdress, which had 10,000 seed pearls and was designed by NormanHartnell. Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex, is the only one of herfour children not to have been divorced. She is an Arsenalsupporter, she revealed while meeting the team at a 2007 receptionin Buckingham Palace. The queen celebrates two birthdays eachyear: the date she was born, April 21nd, and a state-recognisedbirthday on a Saturday in June. She has sat for 139 official portraits . She made her first public address at the age of 14,on BBC Radio's The Children's Hour. She has reared 30 PembrokeWelsh Corgis during her reign. She currently has four: Linnet,Willow, Monty and Holly; as well as three Dorgis (a cross between aDachshund and a Corgi): Cider, Candy and Vulcan. She chatted for10 minutes with Irishman Michael Fagan when he sneaked into herbedroom in 1982, his second break-in at the palace. The queenofficially opens the British parliament every year and has done sosince 1953, except in 1959 and 1963, when she was pregnant withAndrew and Edward, respectively.